‘It’s Always Sunny’ on the internet: Memes that went viral and transcended the small screen (and thrived on even smaller screens)

Stay on TV long enough and you’re bound to make an impact, but mere longevity doesn’t explain It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s repeated permeation into popular culture.

After all, it’s a cable show at a time when cable caché is way down, and while 160+ episodes sound like a lot, that’s barely 220 new minutes of Always Sunny per year, given the series is in its 17th season.

The show’s deranged dialogue, wild plots, and absurdist outlook have proved particularly adaptable in this age of memes and social media. It could be said that Sunny speaks to the paranoid, distracted hopelessness of modern American life, and has been doing so since 2005.

In his recent memoir, veteran comedy writer and director Larry Charles recalled the famous “no hugging, no learning” policy preached in the Seinfeld writers’ room. To hell with the old sitcom playbook that aimed to leave viewers happier and characters better off. Instead, the Seinfeld protagonists took pleasure in remaining emotionally divested from the problems of their relatives, significant others, and sometimes even each other.

But where Seinfeld was amoral, Sunny is actively immoral, and the crimes of its protagonists read more like outward abuse than careless neglect. Mac, Dennis, Charlie, Dee, and Frank are delusional dirtbags, always getting in each other’s way. They don’t apologize, and any regret is short-lived.

Are they lovable? Maybe, but only for their unacknowledged vulnerability. We laugh as they destroy their world again and again, rarely suffering any lasting consequence.

That kind of energy is built for the modern internet — specifically Reddit, where one-liners and references are king, and TikTok, where everyone’s a star and shame rarely sticks.

With that in mind, here are five of the probably hundreds of times It’s Always Sunny has escaped television to find virality online.

Suddenly obsessed with getting health insurance, Charlie (Charlie Day) and Mac (Rob Mac, formerly known as Rob McElhenney) take jobs in an office mail room. There the former goes on a lunatic rant about the vast conspiracy he’s unraveled, as illustrated by his Homeland-style corkboard filled with documents and crisscrossing red yarn. The company, he says, is constantly receiving letters for employees who do not exist, like “Carol in HR” and “Pepe Silvia.”

“Not only do all of these people exist, but they have been asking for their mail on a daily basis. It’s all they’re talking about up there,” Mac interrupts. Turns out, Charlie’s just terrible at his job, and his oft-hinted-at but forever-undiagnosed reading disability doesn’t help.

For 17 years, clips of Charlie, wild-eyed and chain smoking in front of his “murder board,” have been a staple on social media, especially in the internet’s many conspiracy rabbit holes. (The meme has even launched its own conspiracy that “Pepe Sylvia” is Charlie’s misreading of the word “Pennsylvania.” The show’s writers deny this, but what are they hiding?)

Inspired by Sex & the City, Dee (Kaitlyn Olson) tries to assemble a female friend group for cosmopolitan shenanigans. But after her credit card is declined at Philly’s fanciest shoe store, Dee attempts to run away in a pair of ill-fitting high heels, stumbles on her way out the door, and barrels headfirst into the side of a car.

That’s no stunt performer, and the dent in the car door is real. Olson has said she endured months of chiropractic therapy afterward, but damn if it isn’t comedy gold. Videos and GIFs of this moment have been shared for years, and dropped into compilations that show off Olsen’s formidable physical comedy skills. Dee’s bottom-tier status within the Gang is often made manifest by moments of cringey humiliation — gagging, stumbling, lumbering around in a neck brace, etc.

Frank (Danny DeVito) hides inside a leather couch to eavesdrop on a Christmas party. The ruse fails and Frank slithers out through a slit in the leather, sweaty, out of breath, and buck naked. It very much looks like the couch is giving birth to a grown-ass man. No surprise, this audacious and hilarious moment has been frequently memed and shared.

But to truly understand Frank — and, perhaps, the actor who plays him — one need only rewind to season 5, episode 4. Drunk at the funeral for his estranged brother, Frank announces his plan to seduce the widow, then stares into the middle distance. “I don’t know how many years on this Earth I got left. I’m gonna get real weird with it.”

Dennis (Glenn Howerton), having recently driven his truck into the Delaware River, decides to sell it. One potential buyer calls it “a good starter car,” and Dennis goes ballistic. “I shall unleash my fury upon you like the crashing of a thousand waves,” he seethes through clenched teeth “A starter car? This car is a finisher car. A transporter of gods — the golden god! I am untethered and my rage knows no bounds.”

It’s not the only time Dennis has referred to himself as “the golden god,” but this vision of him bellowing, nostrils flaring, neck straining, dead eyes looking nowhere — it is singularly meme-worthy, and Redditors quote it on the regular.

Note: Everyone in the Gang is some flavor of sociopath or narcissist, but Dennis is on another level. In fact, one of the show’s most exquisite slow-roll gags is the implication that he’s a serial killer. He’s vain and conniving. He keeps duct tape and zip ties in his trunk. His “D.E.N.N.I.S.” system of seduction amounts to psychological torture. Dennis belongs in jail.

Sunny went viral for something beautiful in 2018. After years of self-delusion, physical transformations, and short-lived epiphanies, Mac finally came out of the closet and stayed there.

In this episode he struggles with telling his uncaring, incarcerated father, and decides to do it via modern dance. Frank’s on board because he’s Mac’s friend, even though he doesn’t “get the whole gay thing.”

It should have been a disaster, this scene, but it was shockingly sublime and stark and not at all played for laughs. Just five straight minutes of dialogue-free modern dance. And in the end it doesn’t matter that Mac’s dad walks out, because the performance leaves Frank awe-struck and whispering, “I get it.”

From a certain angle, Sunny can be seen as a tragedy, the story of five aging losers who drink too much, fail too often, and never face their demons. But this episode is different. No hugs, but maybe somebody learned something.